Sony Swims In Spider-Man Sequels

Remember Scrooge McDuck swimming around in three cubic acres of money? That’s the vision that Sony execs are currently dreaming about after this weekend’s mega-haul for superhero sequel “Spider-Man 3.”

It’s a nice vision, one any business aspires too, and so further sequels are definitely on the way.

The BBC reports that according to Sony Pictures exec Michael Lynton, it seems everyone at the studio “Has every intention of making a fourth, a fifth and a sixth and on and on.”

Lynton adds that “when everybody comes up for air, we can think about how to make the next one” and adds that old chestnut that they’ll make “as many as we can make good stories for.”

So why’d this entry so well? “I think it had a lot to do with timing – the fact we were the first out in the summer. I think it had to do with the fact that the movie had a universal appeal, it had a broader appeal than the second movie, it attracted a family audience and brought the family audience back.”

The question is will the repeat business hold like the last two? Good word-of-mouth and lack of competition are the two key factors for that to happen – two things the film does not have. Critics proved decidedly mixed, reaction very love/hate in tone (whereas the first two were almost unanimously praised).